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Henry Rollins held a packed house hostage last night in the Lifestyle Communities Pavilion for
nearly three hours.

The former leader of crucial punk band Black Flag, who also has acted, hosted his own cable show
and published many books, did so with just a microphone and a whole lot of words.

That, and an inextinguishable curiosity that has led him to travel thousands of miles, and a
profound humanism that compels him to share it.

When Rollins was asked to deliver the 2009 commencement address at Sonoma State University, in
Rohnert Park, Calif., the high-school graduate took the gig with the spirit of adventure. In
the eyes of the grads he saw only hope he said last night. Amusingly, he riffed about all the bad
stuff he could have forecast for them, including the bad economy, broken marriages and a world in
conflict, but he saw instead "potential and possibility."

"Cynicism," he said, "is only intellectual sloth."

In fact, after an informative summary of key current events he found repressive -- the high
school in Mississippi that cancelled its prom rather than allow a lesbian couple to take part, a
Catholic school that rebuffed a student with two moms -- Rollins insisted that positive change is
possible. We "still have a lot of influence on this (young) century," he said, to make it one where
homophobia, conflict and injustice end.

"We have the Ramones records, we have the pizza. We are ready to get down."

Though all the stories were entertaining and informative, some had tangential connection to the
larger theme of the riches found by a searching mind.

The high-school prom bit found Rollins hilariously improvising about teen angst and confessing
to expert skills at sexual self-gratification.

That was a coda to his account of being a celebrity judge on RuPaul's
Drag Race TV show and the comical conflict he felt over his attraction to some of the
contestants.

Stories about Rollins' dull home life, acting in the cable series
Sons Of Anarchy, and hanging out with his friend William Shatner were light relief to
heavier commentary on the passage of the health-care bill, aid to Haiti, and the overall slowness
of change in America.

Recounting his travels, often in countries demonized by the Bush administration, provided
perhaps the most moving evidence of Rollins' deep egalitarianism and restless curiosity.
Experiences in Sri Lanka, Iran, Lebanon and Pakistan only deepened his feelings that the human
stories behind the conflicts are hidden by governments -- ours and theirs.

"I came out of the chute angry," Rollins exclaimed at one point. But a more positive channeling
of dissatisfaction is rare.